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Oh no you didn’t, Israel

And no, I’m not antisemitic but I seriously do despise the arrogance and inhumanity of the country. It has been in constant war with it’s neighbors, in the process committing many heinous crimes against humanity that for some weird reason much of the world and the fucking UN overlook. It’s gotten worse in recent times, for example in early 2009, Israel carried out a 3 week long offensive on the Gaza strip against Hamas, but at the end of it ended up killing over 1000 civilians of which 300 were children and over 75 were women. A further 5000 were injured in those attacks of which 1600 were children and 750 were women.

Isn’t this murder? Aren’t these war crimes? Shouldn’t Israel be punished for this genocide and crime against humanity, because according to the UN law on human rights, it does. According to the UN –

“The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948) defines genocide (article 2) as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group…” including:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

All such acts are violations of human rights, and may also be crimes against humanity or war crimes, depending on the context in which they were committed. The Convention confirms that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or war, is a crime under international law which parties to the Convention undertake “to prevent and to punish” (article 1). Because it is a part of international customary law the Convention is considered applicable in all countries, irrespective of whether they have signed or ratified it.”

Well it certainly fits the bill, but no action was taken and accusations made, but the incompetence and bias of the UN is a whole other story.

Siting the presence of Hamas as a reason, the Gaza strip has been under a naval blockade since 2007 and it’s continued since, causing much inconvenience to the people of Gaza because it limits their resources. But in 30th May a number of NGO’s assembled a flotilla of six ships carrying aid from different countries. The passengers included activists, diplomats and journalists, and they intended to take the ‘freedom flotilla’ to the Gaza strip. But on the 31st of May Israeli Defensive Forces intercepted the Freedom Flotilla and after meeting resistance from the activists when asked to turn around, attacked the flotilla killing up to 19 activists.

That’s clearly an example of state terrorism, one which for some weird reason the world overlooks. The reason for this is beyond me, but I suppose the world still harbors some sympathy for the Israeli’s considering the holocaust, etc, but does that give them the right to do whatever they want?

7 thoughts on “Oh no you didn’t, Israel”

You need to check your facts, dude. The land Israel stands on wasn’t taken away from the Arabs by the UN as you claim. Palestine was partitioned in to Jewish and Arab territories. The neighbouring Arab nations (Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq) then invaded Israel. In the ensuing war (which Israel convincingly won), the Palestinian territories were overrun and occupied. The occupied areas were then successively expanded with each Arab offensive (Six-Day War, Yom Kippur War, Lebanese War). Since then, Israel has gradually withdrawn from these occupied areas to more or less the original 1948 borders.

While your quoting of the UN definition of genocide is correct, there’s a context you need to accept. For instance “(a) killing members of the group” may not necessarily be genocide unless they are killed BECAUSE they are members of the group. You follow? If not, the killing of a Palestinian sniper or an LTTE suicide bomber becomes genocide. Also, accidental or collateral killings are not genocide for the same reason.

Additionally, you leave out the fact that when Israeli forces boarded the flotilla (in a similar fashion to the ship sent to the north by the UK Tigers), one shipload of activists resisted the boarding, while the other ships surrendered. All the deaths were on that one ship. This is a stunt, like the Tigers tried, using the Greenpeace model, where activists endanger themselves deliberately to gain media attention.

Probably the Israelis have been a bit excessive, but still it’s hardly the state terror you suggest.

Well, the footage from the ships clearly show the Israeli special forces being attacked by the activists (one was even thrown overboard) and they had no choice but to fire into the crowd to prevent them from taking away the Israeli’s weapons.

I am not defending Israel’s past actions, especially the war in Gaza, but the facts remain:

1) Gaza is controlled by Hamas, a banned terrorist organization which has vowed to destroy Israel.

2) Hamas fires rockets from Gaza into Israel, often killing civilians. The blockade of ships and the bombing of tunnels leading from Egypt into Gaza are done by the IDF to prevent Hamas from bringing in more rockets, and due to this effective campaign rocket attacks have dramatically dried up in the recent past.

3) Israel checks aid going into Gaza for weapons at its ports and then sends them overland into Gaza. The aid flotilla could have unloaded its cargo at Haifa, but its intentions were not to supply aid, but merely to force the Israelis into a confrontation.

The loss of life was deeply regrettable, but you can’t expect to attack armed special forces squadrons and not expect to get shot at. I hope the Palestinians and their supporters realise that the only way this issue can be resolved in the long term is through negotiations and not through stupid stunts like this.

My background knowledge of the conflict is superficial at best, but it does appear to me that the primary aim of the flotilla mission was to provoke/get attention, much like the Vanni Mission ship that David mentioned. If delivering aid was the only objective, the activists would’ve chosen a far less confrontational method.

And like Chavie said…what did they think would happen when they confronted one of the most ruthless armies in the world?